


Weapons that know no borders

by Leu (Karaii)



Series: Naruto rarepair generator [2]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Child Soldiers, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-26
Updated: 2019-05-26
Packaged: 2020-03-19 21:55:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18979099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Karaii/pseuds/Leu
Summary: Kakashi is a six year old genin tagging along a mission lead by his sensei Minato Namikaze and his fellow jonin Shibi Aburame. Though unstated, the mission is to track down a couple of missing nin: Kakashi’s dogs track the target, Minato assassinates them, and Aburame disposes of their bodies with his insects.Basically a sad little window into Kakashi’s lack of knowledge over simple things, like the migration patterns of butterflies.





	Weapons that know no borders

Kakashi notices the insects almost immediately. A cloud of yellow flapping objects, bright against the darkening sky, headed straight in their direction. He tenses in preparation for an attack but no one else does. It makes him antsy.

Kakashi gestures with his chin. “Yours?”

The Aburame doesn’t deign to glance at him. “No.”

“They’re butterflies, Kakashi.” Minato gestures in the distance. “They migrate this time of year.”

Butterflies?

He fingers a kunai. He doesn’t want them near him. There’s something wrong with passively letting a hoard of insects fly past him unharmed. He’s seen the Aburame’s insects devour a corpse within minutes, and he wouldn’t put it past these to eat him, too.

“They’re herbivores.”

Kakashi stares at the Aburame. Can his clan read minds, too?

“They will not harm you,” the Aburame continues patiently. “Please do not harm them, either.”

A child of war, Kakashi hears an order instead of a request and he nods sharply. Fine. Still, he draws a little closer to Minato-sensei just in case he needs to protect the man’s back.

To his surprise, though he struggles not to show it, Minato-sensei reaches around and throws an arm over his small shoulders, tugging him close to his side.

“Look.” Minato-sensei’s voice is soft near Kakashi’s ear. “Aren’t they pretty?”

That is a qualifying statement Kakashi has no frame of reference to compare to. He does not know whether they are pretty or not.

“I don’t know,” he says honestly, because chain of command dictates he should be honest about his limitations in a combat situation.

Minato hums. “Shibi-san, can you bring one closer without harming it?”

“I am not sure,” the Aburame says, because he too follows the chain of command. “But I will try.”

He reaches out a broad hand and out trickles a small cloud of black. Kakashi’s keen eyes have already spied twenty separate exit points for the Aburame’s insects in a prior skirmish, but now he detects two new ones, near the fleshy joints where his palm meets his ring finger. His running hypothesis is that each hole houses a different species of insect, though Kakashi knows better than to ask for confirmation: clan secrets are not something you can go around asking details of.

“Here.”

There’s a small crowd on the Aburame’s palm now, delicate black bodies with their delicate yellow wings, and delicate little eyes that Kakashi can now make out on their alien little faces. They flitter around the Aburame’s bugs, uncoiling some sort of flexible horn.

“Is that a tongue?” Minato-sensei asks above Kakashi’s head.

“A proboscis,” the Aburame corrects. “Functionally, you could call it a mouth.”

“Are they going to eat your weapons?” Kakashi asks, meaning the Aburame’s insects.

“No,” the Aburame repeats. “They’re herbivores.” Now he glances at Kakashi, and he crouches down some like Minato-sensei has done, to be more level with his eyes. Kakashi looks at him warily, but the collar of the Aburame’s jacket is at an angle now that Kakashi can see the man is smiling, though his voice continues to be monotonous. “They’re feeding from nectar my  _kinkaichu_  have provided. Do you want to hold one?”

Kakashi has seen these small insects eat a missing-nin.

“A butterfly, boy.” The Aburame murmurs. “Not my parasites.”

“They won’t harm you,” Minato-sensei says encouragingly, and Kakashi takes it as an order.

He reaches out to grab one, but is deftly intercepted by the Aburame’s other hand. “Not like that,” the man chides softly, and shows him how to encourage a butterfly onto his finger. Kakashi isn’t wearing gloves, so he’s hyperaware of the insect’s little black legs. His heart is pounding loudly in his ears. The butterfly’s little alien eyes seem huge, and possibly hostile.

“Aren’t they cute?” Minato-sensei has taken three on his fingers, where they placidly open and close their wings without taking flight. “I think they’re cute.”

Kakashi would not call them thus, but if Minato-sensei considers them cute, then he will take that opinion into account and adjust his judgement. “Cute,” he repeats.

The Aburame laughs softly, a sound that surprises Kakashi for he has never heard this stern-faced jonin approximate anything more lively than a snort. Kakashi’s surprise jostles the butterfly and it float up and away, joining its brethren in that slow moving yellow cloud.

“Do they have a village, too?” Kakashi asks, wondering if they belong to a clan like the  _kinkaichu_  do to the Aburame.

“Not as such. They are not bonded to any ninja clan that I am aware of.” The Aburame gestures behind them, to the south-east, and then points to the north-west, in the direction they are headed. “These butterflies are a wild, migratory tribe. They travel from the Land of Earth to the Land of Whirlpools and back again, unimpeded by borders.”

Kakashi frowns. “Why does the Land of Fire permit them passage? Could they not be spies?”

“Oh, Kakashi.” Minato-sensei does not sound disappointed, but Kakashi feels like he’s disappointed him anyway.

“I apologize if I have said something wrong,” Kakashi says, though he does not know for what. It is a common enough occurrence around Minato-sensei that he has stopped feeling truly bad for it.

“Wild fauna do not care for human borders,” the Aburame explains, standing up from his crouch to reach his full, intimidating height. “The Land of Earth and the Land of Fire and the Land of Whirlpools are divided solely because humans have made it such. Insects care not for such things.”

Kakashi frowns, thinking this over. “They would make good spies,” he insists. “Their movements have become so habitual that they are mundane, and expected. Your clan should make a pact with them.”

The Aburame snorts, and Minato-sensei sighs.

“I apologize if I have said something wrong,” Kakashi repeats by rote.

“Not all animals are sentient enough to form pacts,” the Aburame explains patiently. “My insects do not have a contract with me like your dogs do with you.”

“But you can control them like you can control your insects,” Kakashi insists. He had seen how they had crowded on the man’s hand, drawn by the nectar provided by the kinkaichu.

“Say I could. What would they tell me?” the Aburame humours him. “What would these little spies tell my insects, that speak a different language than they do?”

Kakashi tries to come up with a strategy, but the fact of the matter is he does not have enough information to form a proper argument. “I don’t know,” he says, and falls silent.

“It’s good that you’re thinking outside the box,” Minato-sensei says, clapping Kakashi on the shoulder. “You have a keen mind for strategy, a great quality in a chunin candidate. I’m proud of you, Kakashi-kun.”

Kakashi ducks his head into the  _hitaiate_  that hangs around his neck. The forehead protector is too large and bulky for his child-sized forehead, so until he grows into it, Minato-sensei has encouraged him to wear it like the scarf he is usually so fond of wearing.

“The sun is gone,” the Aburame says. “We should move now.”

“Aye,” Minato-sensei says, and pats Kakashi’s back before hefting to his feet. “Time to get back to work. Have you regained enough chakra to summon Pakkun again?”

Kakashi does not need to be told twice. He unclips the scroll at his waist and nicks his calloused thumb with a kunai.


End file.
